get outta here

I think there ought to be a law: if you live in a climate that is not usually hot and sunny, any day that it is hot and sunny should be spent outside and you should get the day off work. Paid, of course. Working during lovely summer days is really bad for you. I don't have any actual data to back this theory up, but trust me; I know stuff. Someone should supply you with free ice cream for the day as well. Which leads me to my next point - does anyone actually eat the strawberry portion of Neapolitan ice cream? Or does it get left in the freezer in one neat strip in every household?



We're planning on having a barbeque on Saturday as Paul's parents are coming up for a visit this weekend. Again, apologies in advance if the weather turns to crap - it's likely to be our fault. In my continuing quest to steer away from the traditional English "burned on the outside, raw on the inside sausages and burgers" barbeque, I am going to attempt to make ribs. I've found a good lookin' recipe here, but any tips or hints would be most welcome.



Here's to slushy, fruity drinks weather out in the garden. Yay!

pregnant lady, coming through

I've started to notice that I've become a lot more protective of my belly and the general state of my health since becoming pregnant. That's perfectly normal, you might say. Yes, but probably not when it gets to the point that you spend a lot of time in your car swearing at people for not being considerate to your unborn child. For example, I followed a guy down the road the other day with an alarming cloud of black smoke pouring out of his exhaust. The smell saturated the inside of my car as I frantically switched the air flow to circulate the air within the car (instead of taking it from outside). All I could think was "Get your exhaust fixed, you jerk! The fumes coming out of your crappy car might harm my baby!" as I muttered rude words at him hoping he'd turn off the road soon. I have the same reaction to anyone who stops suddenly or swings out in front of me, nudges me with their elbow in the tummy by accident at Tesco, smokes within 20 feet of me, or wears an obscene amount of perfume. All of you - stop potentially harming my foetus! You don't see me leaking pregnancy hormones all over your carpet, do you?? BAH.



But I am feeling a lot less irritable and cranky lately, honest.

hurrah for Ed

Hey, something to blog about! It's Ed and Martine's 12 Monkeys time, and this month's theme is:

Describe your first impression of Montreal.



I'm not sure if we made it through Montreal, but I know we drove through Quebec on our way down to Boston when I was almost 9. The only French I knew was "Je m'appelle Lisa", thanks to the one and only phrase my Dad could remember from his grade 11 French class. I remember stopping at a park where a girl joined me on the swingset. Being the friendly sort I am, I said to her "Je m'appelle Lisa". Of course it never occurred to me that once I got that one phrase out, communication would get a bit tricky if she only spoke French, and sure enough the little girl proceeded to yak away at me at great length in a language I didn't understand. I have a vague recollection of being confused and walking away from the swingset, and thanks to me, this girl probably grew up with the impression that Anglophones are really rude.



The next time I visited Quebec was a weekend with a friend in Montreal in 1989. I absolutely fell in love with the place. There was so much that was completely foreign to me, and I'm not just referring to the language (at this point, my vocabulary had expanded to ordering beer at restaurants and getting cigarettes from the convenience store). I loved how coffee came in big bowls, eating these yummy things called "Croques Monsieurs", and how everyone smoked - anywhere and everywhere. I loved attempting to speak French and trying to decipher conversations happening around me. I loved that it had cobbled streets and a bazillion cafes. I couldn't believe how cheap rent was (remember, this was 15 years ago and it was compared to Toronto) and how easy it was to get around the city. I was smitten.



On a whim that can only happen when you're 20 (or again at 30 if you're me), I decided to move there. My friend went to Montreal ahead of me and picked out an apartment for himself and another one for me, and I moved there without having seen it. I was surprised at how pleased my parents sounded when I announced that I was moving in the next month, but in retrospect it was probably due to relief that I didn't stay put and marry the guy I was with at the time. My Dad rented a van and drove our things 300 miles to Montreal. Ah, the days when my possessions would fit in half a van. I lived in five different apartments, had eight different jobs, and made dozens of very good friends. I left in 2000 to move here, but I will always consider Montreal home. I miss the bagels, the fantastic multicultural cuisine and communities, all the festivals, the "doo dooooooo" sound of the metro, and I even miss speaking French (which vastly improved over 11 years, thankfully). Most of all, I miss my friends.



Of course we'll always have MSN Messenger.

general ramblings

I've been really poor at updating this blog lately, mostly because I haven't had anything specific to blog about. I haven't bought any interesting CDs or DVDs, and the last film we saw was Shrek 2 (i.e. not really fodder for lengthy, thought-provoking posts). I've not read any books lately, and Heat magazine doesn't really count as provocative reading material. We haven't visited any new places, dined at new restaurants, and I haven't come across any new and interesting web sites. I did try a new smoothie drink from Innocent Drinks last week, and it was really yummy. I don't think I could write an entire post about it, though. But do try them next time you're at Sainsbury's.



This isn't to say that life is dull; on the contrary - there is lots going on at the moment. Lots. Hooooo boy, is there ever. I just haven't found any particular topic to blog about lately and haven't updated this site, rather than ramble on about nothing. Erm...not including this post, that is.



I need Mike Meyers as Linda Richman to say to me, "[insert topic here] - discuss. Talk amongst yourselves!"

what's in a name?

I am starting to think that some people come up with baby names by rummaging through Scrabble tiles and randomly picking letters. On one of the web boards I read, a woman posted a message discussing the following potential baby names:

aiken tam

espen rune

jubal sulo

kaio cosme

larkin muir

loki rune

piran kjell

solen rune

tavin dai

thurin sulo

torin boaz



Apparently these are boy names, and both parents are American (i.e. as far as I know, these names do not have cultural significance). Indeed.



I keep forgetting to mention our nickname for the baby: Pip. This came about when I was reading something in the early weeks that said our baby was the size of an apple seed, and Paul decided to start calling the baby Pip. This always reminds me of a Dickensian character on South Park who says "My name is Phillip, but people call me Pip...because they hate me." Needless to say, I love the nickname but it will definitely not appear on the birth certificate.



In other weird news, another workmate is pregnant! She had her first scan yesterday and made the news "public" - and she is due 9 days before me. There must be something in the drinking water.

bonus!

My god, but my nails are gorgeous right now. This is one side effect of pregnancy I can live with, thanks.

meet the midwife

Paul, Jasper and I met Pat the midwife (and student midwife Emma), who turned out to be a bit better in person. She was still quite stern, in a school marm kind of way, but I felt that she knew her stuff - she's a senior midwife, after all. It ends up that she will see me throughout my pregnancy but I will see another team of midwives for the actual birth. I may or may not get a chance to meet these midwives, which is slightly disconcerting. It seems that this is my only choice; there is no "domino scheme" or "team midwifery" that I had been reading about. Everything else was as I expected, except for the surprising news that my hospital has a policy of not telling you the sex of your baby during scans. For that, you go in for another scan at 24 weeks and you must pay extra for it. I've never heard of this sort of policy before, but there you go. Otherwise, we mostly filled out paperwork and I answered a lot of questions about my medical history. My first scan will be at 12 weeks where they will also do some blood and urine tests.



I do feel a bit better now that I've actually seen someone about this pregnancy. I feel like things are moving along and that this is more real in a way. The first scan doesn't seem as far away and woohoo, I'm moving into double digits on Wednesday - 10 weeks and counting! Life, as they say, is good.



I still have an aversion to eating meat (although I actually ordered a roast beef dinner last night with a chicken and prawn starter), and I seem to have developed a huge, loud, and demanding sweet tooth. I will only want to eat a bit of toast for breakfast and maybe a bagel for lunch, but stick some cake or biscuits in front of me and they'll be gone in seconds. This isn't to say that I'm not eating healthy amounts of non-sugary food, but I just have more of an appetite for the sugary stuff. This supposedly means I'm having a girl but then the lack of morning sickness is supposed to indicate a boy. Maybe I'm having a very girly boy or a butch girl. 'Scuse me while I get an ice cream - that's dairy so it counts as healthy food, right?